Playing Games

Why Tim Doesn't Review Games

Tim reiterates that his channel's primary goal is to share what game development is actually like — not to review games. He wants the content to be timeless, not tied to current releases that will feel dated in a few years. He references a previous video explaining this stance in detail.

The Chocolate Analogy

Tim draws a parallel to his chocolate review website, where he has reviewed every chocolate he's eaten since 1993 — searchable by brand, country, year, and type. Despite this exhaustive catalog, viewers of that video still flooded him with "have you tried this one?" questions. He couldn't keep up. He's certain that reviewing games would be even more overwhelming and would consume his entire channel.

The Impossibility of Playing Everything

The sheer volume of games makes completionism impossible. Tim highlights several escalating attempts people make:

• Play every game on Steam — The estimated hours to play them all exceeds a human lifetime, even without sleeping or eating. And new games are constantly added.
• Play every game in a genre — Still impossible. Too many RPGs, too many indie games, too many of anything.
• Play every AAA or every indie game — Still can't do it. The industry is simply too large.

The Discoverability Problem

Beyond time constraints, there's the problem of even finding games. Multiple storefronts are all packed with titles, and free game engines have enabled an explosion of new developers creating games. Discovery is genuinely hard.

The PhD Trap

Tim shares a powerful analogy from his time at UC Irvine's graduate program (1987). The expected timeline for a PhD was about five years. But some students had been there for eight or nine years — disparagingly called "lifers" by Tim's cohort.

The reason? Several of these students had a mental block: they felt they needed to read every paper in their research area before writing their thesis. But new papers were constantly being published. They could never pin down a finish line because the literature kept growing while they read.

This is exactly what happens to aspiring game developers who wait to play "all the games" before starting their own project.

New Releases Will Always Tempt You

Even after you start making a game, new releases will come out. Each one brings the temptation of "the new hotness" — multiplayer, microtransactions, trendy features you didn't design for. If you keep getting swayed by every new release, you'll never finish your game.

Critics and Directors Are Different

Tim enjoys watching game critics like Mortismal Gaming, who reviews games full-time — and even he can't cover every RPG that comes out. But more importantly, Tim makes a sharp distinction:

Being a good critic and being a good game director are very different skill sets. The Venn diagram overlap is thin. Encyclopedic knowledge of games doesn't translate to the ability to direct a good one.

The Takeaway

Tim's advice is direct:

• Play games — for enjoyment and to learn from them
• Don't pretend you'll play everything in a genre or subcategory
• If waiting to play "all the games" is holding you back from making, starting, or finishing your own game — recognize it as a trap and ignore it
• Make your game — players want your flavor, not a Frankenstein of features pulled from other titles

References

• Tim Cain. YouTube video. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o24eaeN6XB4